Archive for January, 2008

I found myself in a unique situation today. I ended up riding the train up the coast back to nocal, which was beautiful. What I didn’t realize was that I was going to spend my entire day on this train. With a stroke of luck I found the movie “Crash” in my room before I left, and I threw it in my backpack before I walked out the door. So I’m sitting on the train, trying to watch this movie, but I kept getting distracted by this woman, this white woman….who was accusing the man sitting behind me of assaulting her. Her claim was that while she was walking through the cabin, someone touched her, but being that we are on a moving train, anyone could have wobbled and bumped into her. But since the guy behind me was the only black man in the cabin, he automatically got the blame. Which was ridiculous. And everyone on the train knew it. This woman was definitely a little crazy…long story short, she complained….but everyone defended the guy. She was soon removed from the train, and everyone went out of their way to talk to the guy to see how he was doing after the whole incident. I had spoken with the guy beforehand, so I knew, and soon everyone else knew, that he was a real nice guy. It got me to thinkin…

If you’ve ever seen the movie Crash, you know how amazing it is. My experience on the train seemed to perfectly fit into the movie I was watching. Both situations deal with absolutely ridiculous amounts of prejudice. I don’t know exactly what I’m trying to get at, all I know is that I’m tired of people saying stuff about certain people being “ghetto”, and all that bs…being ghetto comes in all colors, because “the hood” and poverty comes in all colors. Being “ghetto” isn’t about skin color. Its about the struggles you go through and what you see growing up. Its the way you live and the way you were raised. If you grew up poor, and it shows, chances are that your going to be seen as ghetto, it’s a sad fact, but it should not hinge on what color you are. People who have no experience with “the hood” need to realize that “the hood” itself isn’t defined by skin color, and the people of “the hood” shouldn’t be defined by either their skin color, or their neighborhood.